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The American Basketball League (ABL) was an early professional basketball league. During six seasons from 1925–26 to 1930–31, the ABL was the first attempt to create a major professional basketball league in the United States.
The Philadelphia Sphas, also stylized SPHAs or SPHAS, were an American basketball franchise that existed in professional, semi-professional, and exhibition forms. They played their home games in the ballroom of Philadelphia's Broadwood Hotel. The team's name is an acronym, derived from South Philadelphia Hebrew Association, and the team's players, at least in its earlier years, were primarily Jewish. Future Philadelphia Warriors owner Eddie Gottlieb founded the team as an amateur group shortly after he and some close friends graduated from high school, and it later became a professional team. The Sphas played in many leagues around the Philadelphia area and the East Coast, most notably the Eastern Basketball League and the American Basketball League (ABL), between which the Sphas won 10 championships. The Sphas won a total of 12 championships, their first two coming from the early Philadelphia League and Philadelphia Basket Ball League.
The Original Celtics were a barnstorming professional American basketball team. At various times in their existence, the team played in the American Basketball League, the Eastern Basketball League and the Metropolitan Basketball League. The team has no relation to the NBA Boston Celtics, other than as an indirect inspiration. The franchise as a whole was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1959.
William Walton Sharman was an American professional basketball player and coach. He is mostly known for his time with the Boston Celtics in the 1950s, partnering with Bob Cousy in what was then considered the greatest backcourt duo of all time. As a coach, Sharman won titles in the ABL, ABA, and NBA, and is credited with introducing the now-ubiquitous morning shootaround.
Robert Frederick McDermott was an American professional basketball player in the 1930s and 1940s. He was known as an outstanding shooter and has been called "the greatest long-distance shooter in the history of the game" by contemporaries. His grandson is businessman Bill McDermott. McDermott was named to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1988.
Oscar Benjamin "Ossie" Schectman was an American professional basketball player. He is credited with having scored the first basket in the Basketball Association of America (BAA), which would later become the National Basketball Association (NBA).
The 1962–63 NBA season was the 17th season of the National Basketball Association. The season ended with the Boston Celtics winning their 5th straight NBA Championship, beating the Los Angeles Lakers 4 games to 2 in the NBA Finals.
Edward Gottlieb was a Jewish-Ukrainian professional basketball coach and executive. Nicknamed "Mr. Basketball" and "The Mogul", he was the first coach and manager of the Philadelphia Warriors of the National Basketball Association (NBA), and later became the owner of the team from 1951 to 1962. A native of Kiev, Ukraine, he was elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as a contributor on April 20, 1972. The NBA Rookie of the Year Award, the Eddie Gottlieb Trophy, was formerly named after him.
George Lawrence Senesky was an American professional basketball player and coach. A 6'2" guard from Saint Joseph's University, he was the 1942–43 College Basketball Season's Consensus Player of the Year and played for eight seasons in the Basketball Association of America (BAA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA), all with the Philadelphia Warriors. He later coached the franchise, from 1955 through to 1958, winning the NBA title in 1956.
The Philadelphia Warriors were an American basketball team based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania that was a member of the American Basketball League.
Louis Herman "Red" Klotz was an American professional basketball player. He was a National Basketball Association (NBA) point guard with the original Baltimore Bullets, and he was best known for forming the teams that play against and tour with the Harlem Globetrotters: the Washington Generals and the New York Nationals. He was the oldest-living NBA champion at the time of his death.
Ralph Kaplowitz was an American professional basketball player. Kaplowitz played in the first two seasons of the Basketball Association of America (BAA), now known as the National Basketball Association (NBA), and was, at the time of his death, the oldest living person to have played for the New York Knicks.
Bernard Opper was an All-American basketball player at Kentucky and then professional player in the National Basketball League and American Basketball League.
Bernard Fliegel was an American standout basketball player for the City College of New York (CCNY) during the late 1930s, and later, a professional in the American Basketball League. As a senior in 1937–38, he received the Haggerty Award, given to the best men's basketball player in the New York City metropolitan area, and remains the only winner from CCNY in the award's long history.
Benjamin Auerbach was an early American professional basketball player in the American Basketball League. He had a standout college career for New York University. Despite the shared surname, Ben Auerbach is not related to the Hall of Fame coach Red Auerbach.
John Francis "Moe" Murphy was an American professional basketball and baseball player. Murphy was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and attended Simon Gratz High School, where he led the Philadelphia Public League in points per game with 13.7 in 1942. He spent three seasons playing for the Wilmington Bombers of the American Basketball League (ABL) and briefly embarked on a baseball career with the Cincinnati Reds' Triple-A team. Murphy played for one season in the Basketball Association of America (BAA) with the Philadelphia Warriors and New York Knicks. He returned to the ABL for the 1947–48 season when he played for the Lancaster Roses. Murphy also played for the Philadelphia Sphas.
The 1917–18 season was the first for the team that would become the Philadelphia Sphas. Playing in the minor-league American Basketball League of Philadelphia, the team was known as Philadelphia YMHA, as they were sponsored by the local branch of the Young Men's Hebrew Association. Game-by-game records not available for this season.
The 1918–19 season was the first season played by the team as the Sphas, and the team's second season in the minor-league American League of Philadelphia. Game-by-game records not available for this season.
The 1922–23 season was the first season played by the Sphas in the Philadelphia League, and the only season played by the team in the Manufacturer's League. In the Manufacturer's League, made up of teams from local industry, the Sphas were known as Philadelphia Passon, Gottlieb, Black because they competed on behalf of the owners' sporting goods store. The team was known as the Sphas in the Philadelphia League. Game-by-game records not available for this season.
Howard "Red" Rosan was an American basketball player and coach in the American Basketball League (ABL). Rosan played for the Philadelphia Sphas from 1934 to 1945 and coached the Baltimore Bullets from 1944 to 1946. He was inducted into the Temple Athletics Hall of Fame in 1976 and posthumously inducted in the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 1996 as a member of the Philadelphia Sphas.